SAF’s virtual Idea Exchange at 2 pm ET on Feb. 22 is centered around building a better florist-wholesaler relationships.
The night before a big wedding, florist Tim Healy realized he’d forgotten to order much needed flowers.
“You kind of get that sickening feeling in your stomach,” says Healy, designer and owner of The Posie Peddler in Saratoga Springs, New York. After a quick text, his wholesaler saved the day.
Healy’s story is one that might be familiar to many florists. It highlights why it’s important to have a healthy relationship with wholesalers, which was the subject of a feature story in the January/February issue of Floral Management. Optimizing that relationship is also the focus of Thursday’s virtual Idea Exchange, when wholesalers and florists will gather to share best practices for working together.
A strong relationship begins with understanding the journey of a flower — and the bumps it might encounter along the way, wholesalers say.
“Flowers never stop growing and our pipeline never shuts down,” says Lenny Walker, vice president of sales and operations for Kennicott Brothers Company in Chicago. “Our crew watches that all the way through, looks for problems, and fixes them before it ever even happens.”
Wholesalers are also challenged when it comes to having enough volume and type of inventory, says John Burk, e-commerce and marketing manager at DVFlora in Sewell, New Jersey.
“The challenge is trying to speculate on the inventory to fill the demands that customers want last minute,” says Burk. “If you buy too much based on historical data or trends and we don’t sell that, then there’s a high risk for shrink.”
Many wholesalers are also looking out for the other end of the supply chain: the farms. Sometimes, farms grow more than is needed to fill orders. When that happens, wholesalers will often buy that excess, says Tom Alders, co-owner and president of Alders Wholesale in Campbell Hall, New York and a member of SAF’s board of directors. This ensures the growers remain profitable and sustainable, and it also strengthens the farm-wholesaler relationship. The growers often return the favor later by giving preference to attentive wholesalers when a certain flower is scarce.
To learn more about the challenges and importance of wholesalers and fostering a strong relationship with them, read “Making the Connection” in the January/February issue of Floral Management and register for the Idea Exchange.
Amanda Jedlinsky is the managing editor of SAF News Now.
